Movies and TV

I was reading an article and saw that Windows 10 has built-in Movie and TV APP. I have looked around but I don't see any such thing..

Presently I have HDMI cord from my PC to my TV and can watch movies from my PC to my TV using either VLC or K-lite. The issue as I see it is that my monitor is square and my TV is rectangle. That makes the movie show up square on my TV. Yes I know I can stretch (change the aspect ratio) on either of the movie players and over come this to a minor degree. Also on the TV I can see the player control (not crazy about this).

This may help understanding better. On my old Windows 7 PC I use Plex and is a great program and ONE day I put it on the Windows 10. Until or if Windows 7 dies, I will continue to use Plex.

My question is this: Will this built-in APP help over come the aspect ration issue. If so where do I find it on my PC?.

It would also help is there is tutorial around to get me through this setup.

If you have a UK install of Windows 10 (and possibly other regions) then it's called Films & TV - and no, it probably won't help.

What will help is to change the way you use the TV over the hdmi connection. It sounds like you a currently duplicating your PC display onto the TV. What you should do instead is extend the display to the TV. Then you can have a second desktop for the TV with its own independent resolution. See this tutorial....

...When the displays are duplicated, Windows automatically selects the resolution used according to the max resolution of the smaller display; in Duplicate mode the resolution on all displays must and will be the same!

...In Extended mode you can set and change the resolution independently for each display...

Multiple Displays - Change Settings and Layout in Windows 10 | Tutorials

The first thing I tried was to used the Extended display. When I did that, no videos would play on the tv no matter what I did on the PC. That is why I went to the Duplicate display. At least there the videos did play.

Maybe you can tell me what I am doing wrong with Extended display?

Thanks

huffman said:

The first thing I tried was to used the Extended display. When I did that, no videos would play on the tv no matter what I did on the PC. That is why I went to the Duplicate display. At least there the videos did play.

Maybe you can tell me what I am doing wrong with Extended display?

Thanks

@huffman

Hi there
could be you are a victim of the bandwidth limitation (of the cable - not the internet).

For modern 1080p and 4K UHD moves to play you need to ensure the HDMI cable I think is version 2 . If you've got a SKY Q box or amazon fire stick that work try using the HDMI cable from those.

You'll often find for example that HDMI splitters won't work when using things like Amazon fire TV boxes -- the cheap chinese straight pass through ones though suprisingly do much better than the more expensively packaged "shiny looking" ones.

Depends on the source of your multi-media whether you need HDMI V 2.0 (or greater) - the older HDMI 1.0-1.4 stuff often won't work for some multi-media.

HDMI 1.4 vs 2.0, whats the different and how to choose? | PC4U

Note also depending on your source material there might or might not be DRM involved - the duplicate monitor should work in all cases as it's effectively a single monitor set up in parallel mode but the extended could have a problem with either DRM or the HDMI version or both. Remember in extended mode you are effectively inserting an HDMI splitter and I know from many hours of trying that these don't always work !!!!.

Cheers
jimbo

kari I followed that tutorial to the letter. I can't remember how I got into the change display mode before, but I finally got there. I changed from Duplicate to Extended. Now it said to drag the player from the monitor to the tv. For the life of me I can NOT get it to do that.

I guess I will just stick with Duplicate. One thing I noticed is that I can press the space bar and that starts and stop the movie. If I press the Enter key, it goes full screen. I should be able to set the width and height ratio for the player and that give me the display I want ton the tv. I tried that but it does NOT seem to work.

jimbo45 all I know about the hdmi cable is that I brought it from Amazon a couple weeks ago. That is all I know about it. I ordered it by the length I needed.

What is complicated about CAN NOT drag. It means my mouse will NOT grab it so that I can move it. I even tried Media Player Classic and the same thing, can not grab it and move it.

Add one more thing. When I load a video when in the Duplicate mode. I have NO sound on the TV. Sound comes from speakers hooked to PC. That don't sound right to me. My understanding is that with HDMI I should hear the sound on the TV.